When it comes to leveling up a character how much control do you want to have over the process? 10 Being a game where you spend hours controling the growth of the character, or 1 where its completly taken care of all you need to do is beat enough guys to level up.

Good RPGs - Zachary - Dec 22, 200209:04 AM

I like less control. I think the modification to your character should be down to what you equip them with and their spells (although if what type of spell you learn is according to your level, then I would vote for more control).

Good RPGs - suhbataar - Dec 22, 200204:12 PM

less control

i mean, how much control do you really have over your own fate in real life?

For me, my reply would vary depending on how well the character development is integrated into the gameplay itself. If you have to consciously think about getting numbers up and the like, it detracts from the game. You should be able to, say perfect your skills, while still performing some feat necessary to finish the game. For this reason, I will vote for "less" because it should be less obviously apart from the rest of the game, but not necessarily less development at all.

At first I thought I'd like more control, but then I got to thinking about the RPGs that I personally found fun enough that I finished them :-) Those were Chronotrigger and MarioRPG; those gave you control over character development, but nothing complex. And that way I could go back to the action, which was what I guess I like in a game personally :-)

Right now I'm playing "Mega Man Battle Network 2" on GBA, and it is lots of fun, lots of action, and just enough control over selecting weapons and assigning powerups. I'm also playing Kingdom Hearts on PS2 and that also has rather limited control, while still presenting options. The best RPGs probably ALLOW a player to tweak things to their liking, but don't require it: by default the character will progress at a reasonable level.

Good RPGs - Feanor - Dec 24, 200210:24 AM

I voted 8/10 for more control. I'm playing Morrowind (Elder Scrolls 3) on X-Box, where you can not only improve your skills by practising them, but improve your stats (Intelligence, Strength etc) by improving the skills that utilize them. It's not perfect, and eventually your character becomes ridiculously powerful, but it means that you can concentrate on fighting skills for a while, then stealth, then magic, or all at the same time. The clincher is that you only level up when you make sufficient progress in your core skill set -- the skills related to your class. And you only improve your stats when you level. The good thing is that by practising an intelligence-related skill, even if that skill doesn't help you level, you will get bonuses on intelligence stat when you finally do level up.

So even though security skill improvement doesn't help my Monk character level up, if I improve that skill between two levels, I can use one of my stat improvement points and get two or three point improvements to intelligence, versus only one to, say, endurance (if I didn't improve any endurance-related skills).

The down-side of leveling up based on skill practise is that you can get practise sneaking up on or fighting hand-to-hand with the weakest monsters and gain levels as quickly late in the game as early, so sometimes "more control" means that there are more opportunities to beat the system. But then if someone wants to abandon role-playing in favour of system-beating, if it's fun for them why deny them?

I really enjoyed Deus Ex, It took the shooter out of FPS, it had some character building elements like in a RPG. I'm not too familiar with how other RPG's let you build your character (I've really only played 2D Zeldas), but in Deus Ex you got skill points to use towards building your character. As you played you could put those points towards rifle skills, heavy weapons, pistols, explosives, computer, electronics, medical, lockpicks, and mele weapons. Obviously there wasn't enough to be good at everything, so you had to shape your character to the way that you played. You also got nanotech upgrades to give you extra abilities. Overall I found the RPG elements in the game to make it shine.

Good RPGs - macboy - Dec 29, 200207:16 AM

I voted 8/10 for more control because in real life, you can't decide your fate, but you can decide what you do with your life - what to learn, what to explore, etc.

Quote:Originally posted by AJ Infinity (In case you're wondering where the Ness character in Super Smash Bros. came from, he came from EarthBound and Harvest Moon, 2 SNES games.)

Just a side note: There was an Earthbound for NES before SNES.

Good RPGs - Sta7ic - Dec 29, 200201:33 PM

More control. However, much like Deus Ex (or Halo and Splinter Cell, in parts), one of the nice things to see is that you aren't limited to cutting everything to ribbons with your sword -- there turn out to be other actions you can use beyond Shoot Everything That Moves. "Role-Playing" Games shouldn't be about sticking to the path and slicing through the opposition; having to kill everything between the beginning and the end gets a little depressing.
As for leveling, I think Morrowwind's got a pretty good setup, where you improve by doing things -- not by slaughtering monsters. Let the alchemists, hedge wizards, blacksmiths, etc. improve and level up without having to pick up a sword, axe, or mace. Rewarding work and risk seems to be a better option.

Hmm. Guess I should include the (/rant).

-"Sta7ic" Matt

Good RPGs - Steben - Jan 18, 200308:05 PM

Quote:Originally posted by macboy
Just a side note: There was an Earthbound for NES before SNES.

A further side note: Yes, but the main character of that game was "Ninten". I'll grant you he looked eerily like Ness however. Earthbound for NES (known as Earthbound Zero in the States) was released as "Mother" in Japan, but never made it to the US.

Good RPGs - Steben - Jan 18, 200308:12 PM

Concerning the topic, I like a little control to let you customize your characters, but not too much. Games like Final Fantasy VII and Chrono Cross made my hurt with all the Materia/Element arranging I had to do. I'm more interested in story progression than wasting ten minutes trying to figure out which level my AeroBlaster would be best suited for.

I would like to see a different approach to character development than levelling, which I find outmost boring. Of course, the advantage of levelling is that it allows the character to improve indefinitely and has simple metrics. To be honest, I can't think of a good scheme right now, but maybe somebody will, and that will mark the day of my return to playing RPGs.

- D.G

Good RPGs - Darkgold - Jan 19, 200302:25 PM

Quote:Originally posted by DoooG I would like to see a different approach to character development than levelling, which I find outmost boring. Of course, the advantage of levelling is that it allows the character to improve indefinitely and has simple metrics. To be honest, I can't think of a good scheme right now, but maybe somebody will, and that will mark the day of my return to playing RPGs.

- D.G

Thats partly why I asked this. Cause the one thing I absolutly DO NOT WANT is another stero-typical RPG. Its going to be quite a challenge to develop a system that gives people the option of complete control over the character, but also allows for an automatic system (a one that works too.) But still keep it fun.